Consumer package goods, entertainment and service providers focus on retaining existing customers and generating repeat business. A traditional promotional method employed is the ‘bounce back’ offer which is designed to exchange a purchased product for a chance to receive added value if you return to purchase more. Typically these offers come in the form of a printed coupon; some are more complex and are offered in the form of a collect to win game piece.
Organizations such as state lotteries, quick service restaurants, grocery stores and other retailers may operate marketing programs in which consumers are encouraged through repeat visits, purchases or other means of collecting or receiving, to obtain an entry ticket to a contest or game that awards prizes to entrants. One execution or implementation of this type of marketing promotion provides a free game card piece divided into multiple sections and then awarding random pieces that match those various sections upon purchase from, visit to, or distribution such as by mail, advertising, or other from, the sponsor of the game.
As consumers frequent the product, the retail location, or receive distributions, they accumulate multiple game pieces that can be used to complete the game card. Some of the game pieces are duplicated at higher frequencies than others. Also, consumers may play multiple game cards to try to complete as many as possible to win multiple prizes. Or they may discard the pieces and play to finish a single card. Upon completion of the collecting of the game pieces required for the game card, the card can be exchanged for a prize or an entry for a chance to win a prize in the contest. Typically, such contests are random draw games.
Lottery game providers seek to assist marketing of random draw games by providing game players with a second opportunity random draw game that uses the non-winning game tickets in a subsequent random draw game. A significant drawback to such second opportunity games is tracking the entry and the possession of the non-winning game tickets for the second opportunity game. Game tickets for random draw lottery games are conventionally sold through lottery retailers. The retailers receive the entry payment from the game player in exchange for a game ticket. The retailer during the exchange transaction communicates the details of the game ticket purchase to the game provider. These details include the game information including game and date of the drawing of the game, the game numbers selected for play on the game ticket purchased by the player, validation and authentication information for validating the game ticket if the numbers for play are selected as winning numbers during play of the game, and other conventional lottery game information.
While suitable for issuing game tickets to players for a random draw game, the existing lottery ticket distribution system is not readily practical for receiving and using issued game tickets in a subsequent random draw game of non-winning game tickets as a second opportunity game to retain player's interest in the random draw games of the game provider and reward game players who regularly play lottery games. It is to such that the present invention is directed.